In order to explain my story, I have to
tell a little bit about my childhood. I canít say anything particularly
"bad" happened to me Ė no physical abuse, no sexual abuse, my
parentsí marriage was always strong and we never had any financial
concerns. I was the youngest in a large family and was able to be the
center of attention fairly easily.

But there were also constant
"moods" in the household. There was always someone in a
"mood" Ė thatís what we called it. It would be years before
anyone would hear anything like "bi-polar", or "chronic
depression" but thatís what it was. The brother I shared a room
with was in a "mood" pretty much all the time. What I remember
most was the rages, the constant complaining and the eating binges. And
through it all my parents said he was Ďgoing through that phase.í
Even as a child, this struck me as odd because he had always been in
"that phase".

My greatest fear was that someday, I
too, would go through "that phase". I liked positive
attention, I didnít want people to feel about me as I knew they felt
about him. So, I learned that I must always "act happy" whenever
I was around anyone. I should never complain or fly into a rage, or
anything that would make people think that I was in "that
phase". The problem was that I didnít usually feel happy, I
was filled with this constant feeling of impending doom or worthlessness,
but I knew I was supposed to act happy, outgoing, friendly and
confident. So, I got really good at wearing masks. When I couldnít wear
the mask, I isolated. It was always one or the other. I isolated a great
deal. I remember a pattern developing in 2nd grade where I would wake up
and know that I just couldnít go to school that day. I was just too
scared even though I couldnít put my finger on why I should be scared. I
just was. And so I would tell my mother I was sick and stay home and stay
in my room. I would do this for a stretch of a few days and then go back.
I kept this pattern up for all of my school years. And I remember
beginning in fourth grade praying to God to just let me die. I couldnít
bring myself to kill myself but I wanted to die so badly.

At fifteen, I met alcohol. I loved it
immediately Ė it made the mask so much easier to wear and quieted the
negative feelings inside me. It immediately became a central aspect of my
life. I didnít drink daily but I did do it every weekend. And all week
long, Iíd be counting down until I could do it again. College was much
the same way except that I didnít always wait until weekend and my
drinking now often included sex. Through those four years the feelings of
anxiety and despair rose right along with the alcohol. I could still
"act" happy but the only time I felt happy was when I had a
drink in my hand, or lines of cocaine on my mirror. I did drugs a good
deal but my drug of choice was always alcohol.

Somehow despite all this I made good
enough grades to get into a good graduate school. (I had to go to
graduate school because I terrified at the prospect of trying to have to
work.) I vowed to myself that once I got to graduate school, I would Ďget
my act togetherí. I didnít. Things only got worse, more drinking, more
drugs, more feelings of despair and daily thoughts of suicide, so I
dropped out. I pretended to my family that I was still in school and tried
my best to "act together" at least when I went home on
vacations. I quickly degenerated into a total mess. A few months later, I
got a DUI.

A night in jail made me realized that I
was an alcoholic. I returned to my hometown, told me family that I was
alcoholic and that I needed help. They were stunned. I think they had
known something was wrong but I wanted to believe the act so much that
they were in denial. I went to a therapist within a couple of days and in
that first meeting she confirmed that I was definitely an alcoholic. She
also said that she thought there was something else going on Ė like
clinical depression. She admitted that clinical depression was outside of
what she could handle because she couldnít make the diagnosis nor
prescribe medication, so I should have that checked out by a psychiatrist.
I really had no idea what she was talking about but I was willing to try
anything. I made an appointment with a psychiatrist. The psychiatrist ran
some tests and found that there was definitely depression, but that it was
alcohol-induced, sobriety should clear it up. And so I went back to the
original therapist and threw myself into AA.

I went to meetings every day and therapy
twice a week. She did make me get retested for depression again after a
couple of months sober and the diagnosis was the same. With therapy and
AA, things definitely did get better. My life did seem much more
manageable. But never as better or as manageable as I pretended to
everyone. I blamed myself and was too ashamed to admit to anyone that my
emotions were still pretty dark. I kept hoping it would get better if I
just worked a little harder. And I was a really good actor, sometimes I
even fooled myself.

I was also having problems sleeping. I
was told this was Ďnormalí for where I was in recovery and that it
would pass. 3 months passed with no improvement. 6 months passed, no
improvement - it was actually getting much worse. Iíd sleep about five
hours and wake and couldnít fall back asleep. I tried everything Ė
herbal tea, warm milk, baths, exercise, but nothing worked. Finally at
around 8 months I went to my medical doctor for help. He knew I was in
recovery so he was hesitant to prescribe anything addictive or any of the
usual sleep medications because they had depressants. He recommended a
medicine with a side effect of drowsiness. It was an anti-depressant
called Trazadone but I only needed to take a very small dosage to help me
sleep. I really thought all my problems were behind me now. I could sleep,
I was back in school, and I was sober. And I could hide all my anxieties,
fears, and self-loathing well enough to fool everybody. I didnít expect
it would ever be any different. My doctor continued letting me refill the
Trazadone for a little over a year, at which point he said that he was
worried that there might be something more to this than simple insomnia. I
didnít really know what he was talking about but agreed to go see
another doctor for my sleep disorder.

It wasnít until I walked into the
other doctorís office that I realized that he had sent me to a
psychiatrist. I was shocked Ė how could anyone think that I needed a
psychiatrist, now? I was nearly two years sober! I had been in therapy for
two years and I had worked through most of my "issues". My
troubles were behind me! All I had was a problem sleeping! And once again
I was being presented with an evaluation. I answered what I considered
"honestly". Though I have to admit that I was sort of rewording
the questions in my head before I answered and my answers werenít
completely full. Somehow I would think, Ďnot as much as when I was
drinkingí and say "no". Or I would answer based on how I acted
not how I felt. What I remember thinking most was that I had to answer the
questions, "right" so he would give me a prescription for
Trazadone so I could sleep. My fear was that he was going to think that I
was going to abuse the pills or try to kill myself with them. So, I wanted
to let him know that I was "okay". The other thing that crossed
my mind was that he was doing a really good job describing my older
brother, whom I was, of course, nothing like.

He did not say I was "okay".
He said I was clinically depressed. In fact what he said was that the only
time he had ever gotten the responses that I had given was when someone
had grown up in a household with someone who had a mental illness. One
would express it, the other would mask it out of fear of being confused
with the other. My answers fit the one who would mask. As soon as he said
it, I knew in my heart he was right. I knew it but I couldnít deal with
it. It was just too much. To me, it seemed like he was saying all that
work in therapy and in recovery was just a waste. I thought it meant that
I had been fighting the wrong demon. And I was afraid that I would be
letting down all those people who had helped me so much in getting clean.
I knew he was right but told him he was wrong. He agreed to refill the
Trazadone as long as I gave some thought to the other. He suggested that I
discuss it with my therapist, my sponsor, my sober friends and my family,
to see what they thought. I did discuss it with all of them. I even
brought it up in an AA meeting. All agreed that the doctor was full of hot
air. None of them knew what a good actor I was.

Shortly after that I moved to the
Northwest. I threw myself into AA there as well. I got a new sponsor, I
got sober friends and I did service work. What I did not do was look for a
job. I couldnít, every time I tried to I had an anxiety attack. I would
temp here and there but I couldnít pull myself together enough to really
hit the pavement and find full-time work. And gradually I began
deteriorating emotionally. A few months of a Seattle winter and I was very
close to suicide again. I did go to meetings but I really couldnít do
much else. I thought the problem was that I wasnít working my program
hard enough. I committed to doing the Steps again. I did more service
work. I worked with newcomers. But I was still a mess. If I wasnít at a
meeting, I was isolating in my apartment. It took supreme effort to even
get the energy to go to the grocery store. I felt like I was in the bottom
of a well. And the thoughts of suicide grew stronger and stronger. Nothing
seemed to work, I couldnít Ďsnap out of ití. I had reached the
planning stages when I suddenly remembered that earlier diagnosis of
clinical depression. It was just a flash out of the blue but I knew
immediately that that was it.

I made an appointment with my doctor for
the next week. I somehow stumbled through the following days just barely
holding on in a sort of a fog. It didnít take the doctor long to write
me out a prescription for Prozac. I reacted well to it. No bad
side-effects. Within a few weeks we had determined the best dosage and I
could feel the medicationís affects. I had a spring in my step and felt
like a huge burden had been lifted from my shoulders. A few weeks after
that I had a good job and life seemed better than I could have ever
imagined. I was so grateful that I had not given into my suicidal
impulses.

I really wish that was the end of my
story. It was not. Once the dosage was set, I thought the problem was
fixed. I checked back in at six months. Again at a year and then it was 2
years later that I went back. I never joined a support group for
depression. I never went to a doctor that specialized in depression, just
my medical doctor. I never even learned much about the disease or my
medication. Occasionally, I would miss a day or two or more and knew that
was bad but didnít worry about it too much. I had a hard time talking
about it and really didnít like to think that I had a mental illness.
Being an alcoholic didnít bother me at all but I couldnít even get the
words Ė "mentally ill" out of my mouth.

Things were really good for a few years.
But I did notice that things were getting harder. I had less energy. I was
isolating more. I was acting out sexually. I sort of considered that it
might be the depression but pushed it out of my mind. I blamed my job. I
blamed the Northwest. I blamed my relationship. I blamed myself for not
working my AA program harder. And things just kept getting worse and
worse. I became obsessed with the idea that if I could just move back
home, everything would be fine. I could tell I was slowly moving slowly
downhill and then not so slowly and then one day I found myself in a hole.
I couldnít even leave my house without my heart pounding in my chest. I
was filled with constant fear and terror. I tried going to work and just
turned around at the front door, I just couldnít go in. My thoughts were
so jumbled and confused I donít know what I thought. I know what I did.
I took a leave from my job, stuffed what I could in a suitcase and flew
home for some Ďrestí.

Once back home things didnít get much
better. I did go back to where I had gotten sober 8 years earlier for some
meetings but I was an outsider now. I had been gone too long, the faces
had changed. I remember talking in a rambling way in one of the meetings
and discussing my depression and the fear that had resurfaced. That was
very hard for me to do because of the shame I had of it. And someone came
up to me afterwards and said something really weird Ė that I should
limit to shares to the topic of Ďalcoholismí. That really threw me in
the state I was in and all I could feel was embarrassment and shame. I
still went back but didnít discuss the depression again.

All I can say is my mind was really
confused during this period. I knew I needed to see a doctor but was
confused by the rules given to me by the HMO. I was out of state and didnít
know if my emotional state qualified as an emergency. I was too ashamed to
ask. I decided I would pay for it myself, I called a doctor and when asked
if I had insurance, I hung up. I was just in a daze. Mainly I sat in my
parentís backyard and read. I did decide that I would not go back to the
Northwest and resigned my position there. I told my housemates that they
could have all of my belongings. My state gradually did begin to improve a
little. I was able to go out and socialize. I was even able to pick up
some consulting work fairly quickly. I was still in a bad state but the
worst was over.

I guess I had been back about 2 months
when I was handed a drink at a party that I thought was juice. I knew as
soon as it hit my mouth that it had alcohol in it. And even though I had
not had a craving for a drink or had not planned on drinking, as soon as
that alcohol hit my mouth, I was so glad I had a drink in my hand. I drank
it and had another. And I felt better than I had in over at least a year.
All the anxiety and depression seemed to just drain out of me. This was 3
days before my 8th year anniversary. I knew it was a mistake, I knew I
would regret it the next day but it felt so good not to feel.

The next day I went back to AA and
admitted what I had done and picked up a 24-hour chip. And was drinking
again within a few days. And another new chip. And another. After a couple
of months I was just too ashamed to keep going back and stayed away. I
also stopped taking my anti-depressants altogether. The next 15 months
consisted of drugs, alcohol, isolating, acting out sexually and doing my
best not to think about what a disaster my life had become. I was able to
pick up odd consulting jobs, designing databases or web sites Ė mostly
work I could do from home. I wasnít drinking daily, I would not drink
for a couple of weeks and then binge. Then I got arrested. Nothing major
but I did have to spend a night and a day in the city jail. Itís hard to
deny that your life has become a disaster when you are in lock-up. I
thought about suicide for awhile but just couldnít do that to my family.
My love for them is really what had always stopped me from going through
with any plans. Since I wasnít going to kill myself, I prayed for my
Higher Power to show me the way out of it. I didnít want to kill myself.
Then I had a moment of utter clarity. I needed to stabilize my depression
and quit drinking. I would have to really deal with the depression this
time and really get treatment for it as well as recovery from the
substance abuse. I had sort of known this for months, but I didnít know
how to go about getting it. I had lost my health insurance with my last
job. I figured it would have to wait until I got health insurance and I
never seemed to get it together enough to get health insurance. It didnít
even occur to me to go through a public agency until I was sitting in
jail.

I thumbed through the phone book and
found the local mental health agency so I could get some help with the
depression. The alcoholism and drug abuse, I figured I would get help from
AA. At least thatís what I think I thought Ė I was pretty much in a
depression daze. The mental health agency referred me to a substance abuse
clinic where they said I would also get help with the depression. I had an
appointment set up in two weeks for an interview to determine what
treatment group to put me in.

I started to get worried about this
during my initial interview. I explained my situation to the substance
abuse counselor. I explained my diagnosis and told her that I really
needed help with my depression. She started telling me that my depression
was probably alcohol-induced and would pass once I was a few months sober.
I stared at her in disbelief. I thought that maybe she had not heard me
correctly, that the depression had been diagnosed while I was two years
sober. That I had had a major episode before I started drinking. She told
me not to worry, in a few weeks I could meet with the psychiatrist if I
passed my drug screens. I was disappointed that I would have to wait but
accepted it. A couple of weeks later I started an intensive outpatient
treatment program.

The group I was placed in was strictly
for substance abuse but I didnít know that at the time. I was a month
clean by then but still a mess. I was in a daze, barely able to leave my
house. I had a couple of clients that I was doing small projects for but I
was able to do most of the work from home. Group started and all the work
in it was on substance abuse. A couple of weeks later I was able to start
my medication and a couple of weeks later I started to really feel the
effects. In group though, I noticed fairly early on that the issue of
mental illness just wasnít to be discussed. Iíd say ĺ of the people
in my group were on medication but the topic was always substance abuse.

If I talked about my depression, the
counselors listened politely but really didnít say anything. I was
researching on my own by this point because I really knew that I needed
"something" more. I guess I was four weeks into the program,
feeling much better by then that I really started to make my feelings
about the program clearer. I wanted help understanding my depression. I
understood alcoholism, I needed to understand the other half of my
illness. Finally in a one on one session with my counselor, she admitted
that she really didnít have any training in depression. She was trained
in substance abuse. And the other counselor didnít even know what
dual-diagnosis meant. My mouth gaped. Did I mention that my home is in
Louisiana? Weíre a little behind the rest of the country on some issues.

The rest of my time in the program was
trying to educate my counselors. We had many back and forths but luckily I
had found enough information on the Internet that I was confident that I
was heading in the right direction. It also helped that I had had so much
sober time and knew the lingo so well. Finally the time came for me to
give my First Step. That itself had been sort of a battle because the
First Step format they had given me was solely on substance abuse. I
thought that would be limiting it and forcing me to deny the problems that
had been caused by depression. They finally said I could include something
about depression if I wanted to. I wrote it all out, it was such an
eye-opening experience for me. I could see how the theme of depression and
substance abuse had gone hand in hand all my life. When I wasnít denying
the alcoholism, I was denying the depression.

I handed it to my counselor and set up an appointment to see her the day before I would give it to group. It was a real break-through I think for both of us. I wonít go into all the details but she agreed that what I had "added on" about depression was what she wanted the group to hear the most. The effect on the group was pretty dramatic as well. Others who were taking medication prescribed at the clinic were shocked to find that they were "dually-diagnosed" Ė they had never heard the term. Two people who had never talked about their depression admitted that they had tried to commit suicide years before they ever picked up a drink or drug and had never put together the connection of their using with their depression. Everyone wanted to learn more. I showed them some of the stuff I had found on the Internet and told them about "The Dual Disorders Recovery Book."

Itís amazing how quickly it all came
together after that. The counselor had me meet with a new assistant
director of the clinic, who did know what dual diagnosis meant. And she
was saddened but not really shocked to hear my story. She knew they were
behind and had been trying to get others at the clinic to learn more about
it. With her help we started our cityís first DRA meeting at the clinic.
I was a bit nervous at the first meeting because I was the only one who
had ever actually read any of The Dual Disorders Recovery Book. The
others were there, I think partly out of curiosity and partly because they
cared about me. We read, Chapter 2 Ė Hope and Healing a Comprehensive
Approach. We finished the chapter and there was quiet for a minute and
then everyone started talking at once. Weíve been meeting now for 3
months. Most of the people in our group were the people in my group at the
clinic. A few more have joined us. The clinic has actually started
referring people to our group.

Most of us have been in recovery awhile
but all this information is brand new and I canít tell you what a
difference it has meant to all of us. For us, itís like the missing
piece to the puzzle. We still go to other meetings at NA, AA or CA but
this group is the one we call home. This is where we go to really learn
about our disease.

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